The lower house of Parliament decided Friday to lift immunity for the prime
minister and his ANO senior party colleague Jaroslav Faltýnek to face
criminal charges for the alleged abuse of EU funds in connection with the
Stork’s Nest complex. Despite having consistently denied any wrongdoing,
Prime Minister Andrej Babiš and his close associate asked for their
immunity to be waived during the heated debate.

Andrej Babiš, photo: CTK
The investigation of the Stork’s Nest case, which has been dragging on
since the end of 2015, was poised to reach an important turning point on
Friday. Following the recommendation of parliament’s mandate and immunity
committee on Tuesday for parliamentary immunity to be lifted, MPs in
the Chamber of Deputies debated for four-and-a-half hours whether to follow
suit.

The final outcome was 111 for the police prosecution to push ahead and 69
against.
All parties with the exception of ANO had announced their decision to strip
Mr Babiš and Mr Faltýnek of their immunity. Miroslav Kalousek, former
leader of TOP 09, repeated his party’s stance at the Chamber of Deputies
on Friday:

“There is a suspicion that someone stole 50 million crowns. He took
it
and used it for his own personal purposes. If this was a criminal offence
that can only be decided by an independent investigation. We definitely
shouldn’t prevent this investigation from taking place.”

Babiš and Faltýnek had already been stripped once of their immunity but
regained it when re-elected to parliament October.

Miroslav Kalousek, photo: CTK
In his speech in front of the Chamber of Deputies on Friday, Andrej Babiš
repeated that the affair was artificially created and intended to force him
out of politics:

“The case is completely fabricated, promoted by the media, and
misused
for political purposes. We live in a country where it is possible to
commission criminal charges against someone and have them thrown in
jail.”

“You have been responsible for four years for the police, the public
prosecution office and the judiciary. What have you done to prevent this
from taking place? Nothing!”

The scandal surrounding PM Babiš comes as he continues to try and form a
viable government following his failure to win a confidence vote the first
time. Most of his political opponents say they will not support a prime
minister who is charged with fraud.

ANO this week already re-started negotiations with the Social Democrats and
the Freedom and Democracy Party (SPD), but without any clear results so
far.

The Social Democrats said they can only confirm a possible government
alliance with ANO after a party congress, which takes place in
mid-February, to select a new leadership following disastrous election
results.

Jiří Drahoš, photo: CTK
The talks with the anti-immigrant and anti-EU party Freedom and Democracy
on Thursday reportedly got little past first base with only broad political
aims subject to discussion.
Meanwhile, another threat to Mr Babiš’s political future may come from
presidential candidate Jiří Drahoš, who advanced to the presidential
run-off.

Mr Drahoš had previously made clear that having a prime minister who is
facing charges was “unacceptable” and said Babiš’s ANO party should
not be given a second chance to form a government. The final presidential
vote takes place on January 26 and 27.